Vectrex
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I bought one of these off eBay for nostalgia's sake: Vectrex - Wikipedia[^] It's really cool and it uses a relative of the Motorola 6502. But the weirdest thing about it is that it has only 1K of RAM! Imagine being tasked to write a video game that doesn't use more than 1K of RAM! The sound effects are in league with the Apple ][. A single voice driving a single small speaker. Does anyone else like to collect vintage computing devices?
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
At least I find it fun to read about. Yet I doubt that I would be spending many hours playin games on that machine :-) A small side remark: I looked around a few Wikipedia pages - some are of a strange kind, such as List of commercial failures in video games [^], which lists the Vectrex among 32 other gaming hardware failures, and also lists 27 gaming software failures. I mean: How did we survive in the old days, without Wikipedia to provide such absolutely essential information? :-) Another remark: Referring to 6809 as 'a relative of 6502' ... well ... Sure, they were both marketed as 8-bitters. Just like 8086 and MC68K were 'relatives', as they both were 16-bitters, at least externally. (68K had several 32-bit features, and 6809 had a number of 16-bit features.) But who cares about such details, 40 years later? (For those who remember the CPU wars of the 1980s, essentially between x86 and 68K: That is one of my prime examples to illustrate that sometimes, the best one does not win. But that is another discussion.)
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I bought one of these off eBay for nostalgia's sake: Vectrex - Wikipedia[^] It's really cool and it uses a relative of the Motorola 6502. But the weirdest thing about it is that it has only 1K of RAM! Imagine being tasked to write a video game that doesn't use more than 1K of RAM! The sound effects are in league with the Apple ][. A single voice driving a single small speaker. Does anyone else like to collect vintage computing devices?
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
I put together a GitHub - Kris-Sekula/mgh80: Simple 5 IC Z80 singe-board computer[^] kit, just for the fun of it. I played with it for a while then I got another simple Z80 board, added a keypad, 6 - 7-segment display and created a monitor program for it in assembler. Had a lo9t of fun with it but haven't had a chance to go back and do any more with it.
The most expensive tool is a cheap tool. Gareth Branwyn JaxCoder.com
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I put together a GitHub - Kris-Sekula/mgh80: Simple 5 IC Z80 singe-board computer[^] kit, just for the fun of it. I played with it for a while then I got another simple Z80 board, added a keypad, 6 - 7-segment display and created a monitor program for it in assembler. Had a lo9t of fun with it but haven't had a chance to go back and do any more with it.
The most expensive tool is a cheap tool. Gareth Branwyn JaxCoder.com
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At least I find it fun to read about. Yet I doubt that I would be spending many hours playin games on that machine :-) A small side remark: I looked around a few Wikipedia pages - some are of a strange kind, such as List of commercial failures in video games [^], which lists the Vectrex among 32 other gaming hardware failures, and also lists 27 gaming software failures. I mean: How did we survive in the old days, without Wikipedia to provide such absolutely essential information? :-) Another remark: Referring to 6809 as 'a relative of 6502' ... well ... Sure, they were both marketed as 8-bitters. Just like 8086 and MC68K were 'relatives', as they both were 16-bitters, at least externally. (68K had several 32-bit features, and 6809 had a number of 16-bit features.) But who cares about such details, 40 years later? (For those who remember the CPU wars of the 1980s, essentially between x86 and 68K: That is one of my prime examples to illustrate that sometimes, the best one does not win. But that is another discussion.)
trønderen wrote:
Yet I doubt that I would be spending many hours playin games on that machine
True, it wouldn't hold my interest for very long either. But I like to have vintage computing devices. Reminds me of the golden age of home computers.
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
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trønderen wrote:
Yet I doubt that I would be spending many hours playin games on that machine
True, it wouldn't hold my interest for very long either. But I like to have vintage computing devices. Reminds me of the golden age of home computers.
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
Richard Andrew x64 wrote:
Reminds me of the golden age of home computers.
You mean bronze age of computers. Today is the golden age. You can go down to the store and pick up a perfectly useable one for less than $500 that will handle some pretty impressive games that would have been utterly impossible back then, even if you shoveled out over $10,000. Or a million dollars, for that matter. I remember doing FEA in college, and the computation took hours to days. Now it is pretty much instantaneous. God, I don't miss those old 386's. Bootups in minutes...
Our Forgotten Astronomy | Object Oriented Programming with C++
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Looks interesting! Must've been like programming a TRS-80!
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
Probably, never had one. Had a Commodore64, that was a lot of fun.
The most expensive tool is a cheap tool. Gareth Branwyn JaxCoder.com
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Richard Andrew x64 wrote:
Reminds me of the golden age of home computers.
You mean bronze age of computers. Today is the golden age. You can go down to the store and pick up a perfectly useable one for less than $500 that will handle some pretty impressive games that would have been utterly impossible back then, even if you shoveled out over $10,000. Or a million dollars, for that matter. I remember doing FEA in college, and the computation took hours to days. Now it is pretty much instantaneous. God, I don't miss those old 386's. Bootups in minutes...
Our Forgotten Astronomy | Object Oriented Programming with C++
Whatever you call the age, (its color depends upon your historical frame of reference,) vintage computing equipment reminds me of the time when I was first discovering computers as magic devices.
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
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Whatever you call the age, (its color depends upon your historical frame of reference,) vintage computing equipment reminds me of the time when I was first discovering computers as magic devices.
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
Ahh! The Magic Age! :thumbsup: Every day...
Our Forgotten Astronomy | Object Oriented Programming with C++
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Ahh! The Magic Age! :thumbsup: Every day...
Our Forgotten Astronomy | Object Oriented Programming with C++
I find your reply fascinating, even if it doesn't make any sense to me.
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
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I find your reply fascinating, even if it doesn't make any sense to me.
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
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I find your reply fascinating, even if it doesn't make any sense to me.
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
(Back then was magic. Now is also magic.)
Our Forgotten Astronomy | Object Oriented Programming with C++
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I bought one of these off eBay for nostalgia's sake: Vectrex - Wikipedia[^] It's really cool and it uses a relative of the Motorola 6502. But the weirdest thing about it is that it has only 1K of RAM! Imagine being tasked to write a video game that doesn't use more than 1K of RAM! The sound effects are in league with the Apple ][. A single voice driving a single small speaker. Does anyone else like to collect vintage computing devices?
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
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(Back then was magic. Now is also magic.)
Our Forgotten Astronomy | Object Oriented Programming with C++
Of course it is, I'm not disagreeing. I just think everybody likes to remember the "good ol' days".
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
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I bought one of these off eBay for nostalgia's sake: Vectrex - Wikipedia[^] It's really cool and it uses a relative of the Motorola 6502. But the weirdest thing about it is that it has only 1K of RAM! Imagine being tasked to write a video game that doesn't use more than 1K of RAM! The sound effects are in league with the Apple ][. A single voice driving a single small speaker. Does anyone else like to collect vintage computing devices?
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
You mean like that '80-es ZX81 sitting next to a '90-es Sailor radiotelephone and a '60-es EICO oscilloscope? :laugh: Yes, I like old stuff.
Mircea
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At least I find it fun to read about. Yet I doubt that I would be spending many hours playin games on that machine :-) A small side remark: I looked around a few Wikipedia pages - some are of a strange kind, such as List of commercial failures in video games [^], which lists the Vectrex among 32 other gaming hardware failures, and also lists 27 gaming software failures. I mean: How did we survive in the old days, without Wikipedia to provide such absolutely essential information? :-) Another remark: Referring to 6809 as 'a relative of 6502' ... well ... Sure, they were both marketed as 8-bitters. Just like 8086 and MC68K were 'relatives', as they both were 16-bitters, at least externally. (68K had several 32-bit features, and 6809 had a number of 16-bit features.) But who cares about such details, 40 years later? (For those who remember the CPU wars of the 1980s, essentially between x86 and 68K: That is one of my prime examples to illustrate that sometimes, the best one does not win. But that is another discussion.)
I had the Radio Shack Color Computer (Coco), and it used a 6809 processor, was actually pretty impressive. Beyond the standard DOS OS that a lot of microcomputers of the time, RS also sold a version of OS-9, a small multi-threaded operating system (well, probably more of a task switcher, but still cool on such a small platform).
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I bought one of these off eBay for nostalgia's sake: Vectrex - Wikipedia[^] It's really cool and it uses a relative of the Motorola 6502. But the weirdest thing about it is that it has only 1K of RAM! Imagine being tasked to write a video game that doesn't use more than 1K of RAM! The sound effects are in league with the Apple ][. A single voice driving a single small speaker. Does anyone else like to collect vintage computing devices?
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
-
I bought one of these off eBay for nostalgia's sake: Vectrex - Wikipedia[^] It's really cool and it uses a relative of the Motorola 6502. But the weirdest thing about it is that it has only 1K of RAM! Imagine being tasked to write a video game that doesn't use more than 1K of RAM! The sound effects are in league with the Apple ][. A single voice driving a single small speaker. Does anyone else like to collect vintage computing devices?
The difficult we do right away... ...the impossible takes slightly longer.
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I had the Radio Shack Color Computer (Coco), and it used a 6809 processor, was actually pretty impressive. Beyond the standard DOS OS that a lot of microcomputers of the time, RS also sold a version of OS-9, a small multi-threaded operating system (well, probably more of a task switcher, but still cool on such a small platform).
Ah, and it came with the very characteristic MC6847 graphics chip. Remember that awful text mode? You only have two choices of colors. Text can only be dark green on a light green background or brown on a bright orange background. Bleeding eyes are guaranteed and the fixed color palettes of the graphics modes are not better. The 6847 used to be quite common back then and even today is still relatively easy to find for building your own 8 bit computers. I have two of them in my parts box. but when the day ever comes that I will actually build a graphics card for the Zwölf, I will probably take a TMS9918 instead. Or, if I actually have to use it, I will probably 'forget' to correctly mix in the color signals and leave the video signal grayscale only.
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats. His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
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I think that's more computing power than Honey the Codewitch uses on a daily basis. :laugh:
That could be true: Not long ago, I was working on an IoT-project (similar to Honey) using an ARM M0 that could be clocked as low as 32 KiHz. Total power consumption is very dependent of clock frequency, and IoT is very dependent on not draining the batteries too fast. This M0 at 32 KiHz had extremely low power requirements. (A common in-house joke was that it could run on the leakage current from the battery :-)) I would not be the least surprised if an 1.5 MHz 6509 could do a lot more that that ARM IoT chip. At the same time, I suspect that the factor in power requirement was a lot higher that the factor in processing power.
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Richard Andrew x64 wrote:
Reminds me of the golden age of home computers.
You mean bronze age of computers. Today is the golden age. You can go down to the store and pick up a perfectly useable one for less than $500 that will handle some pretty impressive games that would have been utterly impossible back then, even if you shoveled out over $10,000. Or a million dollars, for that matter. I remember doing FEA in college, and the computation took hours to days. Now it is pretty much instantaneous. God, I don't miss those old 386's. Bootups in minutes...
Our Forgotten Astronomy | Object Oriented Programming with C++
Lead. The correct metal to name the age after would have to be lead, as in soldering together your own hardware. These also still were the days when my old cat used to toast her rear parts on my 4k RAM expansion.
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats. His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
